28.12.2013

The Bethlehem story and present reality


Finian Cunningham  Press TV

The annual Christmas celebrations around the world conjure up a kaleidoscope of emotions, ranging from the sombre to the joyful, from pity to awe.

One thing often missing though from the celebrations is a connection between the original historical event — some 2,000 years ago — and how this story relates to present reality.

But a new billboard campaign in the US is giving the Christmas story a refreshing, but realistic, contemporary meaning.

Massive public hoardings, currently on display in various cities across the US, show Mary, pregnant with her soon-to-be-born baby son, Jesus, being led on a donkey towards the ancient Palestinian town of Bethlehem by her husband Joseph.

Confronting this weary family is not the occupying forces of the Roman Empire, as in ancient accounts of the nativity, but rather it is the occupying forces of the Zionist Israeli regime.

The billboards, organized by campaign group IfAmericansKnew.org, show the present-day reality of Bethlehem, the town where Jesus is reputed to have been born nearly two millennia ago.
Palestine Apartheid Wall 23
Gone are sword-wielding Roman centurions, they are replaced by Uzi machinegun-toting Israeli soldiers.

But the essential story remains the same one of foreign military occupation and oppression of innocent civilians. Indeed, given technological advances, it is easily arguable that today’s occupation of Bethlehem and other Palestinian communities is much more brutal and oppressive under the Israeli regime than it was under Caesar.

At this time of year, millions of Christians around the world, as well as Muslims and many other faiths, celebrate the event of Jesus Christ’s birth as a sign of hope for humanity. This hope stems from the fact that, amid physical conditions of extreme privation and injustice, a baby was born into this grim world.

Yet, it is peculiar that while this historic event is venerated across the world, often in exalted cathedrals of opulence and splendor, the harsh reality of Jesus’ birth and its significance is weirdly sanitized and reduced to a sentimentalized travesty.
Palestine Apartheid Wall 22
Today, Bethlehem, as for other parts of the Palestinian Occupied Territories, continues to be under an illegal and brutal siege. The town of some 22,000 inhabitants is cut off from the outside world by an eight-meter concrete wall built illegally by the Israeli regime.

This regime, based in Tel Aviv, has violated countless international laws since 1948 until today, including the UN Charter and Geneva Conventions, to dispossess more than 95 per cent of historic Palestine and to turn that entire territory into an apartheid police state, where Palestinian Christians and Muslims are killed, kidnapped, imprisoned and thrown out of their homes with total impunity. That duress includes Palestinian babies born literally on roadsides and in makeshift dwellings because of heinous, inhumane Israeli travel blocks.

On Christmas Day this week while the world was “celebrating” the historic birth of Jesus, a three-year-old Palestinian girl, Hala Abu Sbeika, was being buried. Hala was killed the day before by an Israeli air strike on the Gaza strip, allegedly in retaliation for the fatal shooting of an Israeli defense worker. It was the usual disproportionate criminal response from the barbaric occupying Zionist regime, which regularly and indiscriminately kills thirteen times more Palestinians for each Israeli fatality.

Bethlehem is also surrounded by four large Israeli settlements — each the size of a city and each of them built illegally in contravention of international law. This Israeli construction has been at the expense of the farmers and shepherds of Bethlehem, whose land is confiscated and ring-fenced. Also confiscated is Palestinian water. Israeli occupiers enjoy limitless supply of water for their villa swimming pools and gardens, while Palestinian farmers and families share dilapidated pipes that routinely run dry.
Palestine Apartheid Wall 21
Christian Palestinians who wish to visit Bethlehem from others parts of the West Bank or Gaza and from other Arab countries are prevented from doing so by the Israeli occupiers. As Press TV’s correspondent Nel Burden reported this week, even in this special week of Christmas commemoration, the grounds given for denying entry to Bethlehem by the Israelis is a vague, callous one of “security”.

This arbitrary prohibition on people celebrating their religion is a calculated insult by the Israeli regime, and no doubt is part of its long-term campaign to further depopulate Palestinian territories and “correct” the demographic facts on the ground.

In short, the Israeli military assault on Bethlehem and Christmas is but just one facet of the wider genocide against Palestinians. That genocide is allowed to happen largely because Western governments in Washington and Europe either support the Israeli regime with billions of dollars a year in military aid or, at best, refuse to hold Tel Aviv to account under international legal standards.

There are no grey areas in this matter. Either we oppose the genocide or we support it through varying degrees of complicity. This is a matter that affects all human beings, whether Christian or Muslim, or any other. And the growing commercial and cultural boycott of Israel by citizens around the world is proof of a global awakening despite the moral torpor of their governments.

Ironically, as Western political leaders send out their usual perfunctory Christmas messages proclaiming goodwill, and while many of them attend church ceremonies paying homage to the Christian nativity story, these same leaders are blind to the ongoing real and urgent meaning of that beautiful story.

Believers hold that Jesus came into this world as a sign of hope of human victory against injustice and oppression, and as a promise of world peace. Fulfillment of that promise depends on what other human beings do about it.

In today’s world, the Christmas story is as relevant and as powerful as ever. The same location and circumstances of Bethlehem should make that shockingly obvious. 
Palestine Apartheid Wall 19

24.12.2013

Christmas Amnesty


Russian President Vladimir Putin has pardoned 2,000 people who can now spend Christmas with their families. Among the freed are Greenpeace activists (arctic 30), two members of the punk band Pussy Riot, and oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

Khodorkovsky was hastily flown in a private jet to Berlin to be paraded in the Berlin Wall Museum in front of an enthusiastic crowd of Western journalists, eager to extract disparaging statements about Putin and Russia. They didn’t succeed, as Khodorkovsky was tight-lipped, but they nevertheless had a field day, using dutifully the cue for slandering and denouncing the evil Russian system and Putin.

Khodorkovsky, once number 16 on Forbes list of billionaires, was in 2003 arrested and subsequently found guilty of fraud, tax salvation, embezzlement, and money laundering. The European Court of Human Rights ruled, that the trial was not politically motivated and that the charges against him were grounded in reasonable suspicion.

The Pussy Rioters, convicted for hooliganism, after they had invaded the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow to stage an impromptu performance on the soleas, were not at all thankful for their release and instantly denounced their pardon as publicity stunt and hoax. Their musical talents may be questionable, but with the help of US NGO NED (National Endowment for Democracy), they will for sure find a stage and an appreciative audience for further activities.

The Greenpeace activists expressed relief but also declared, that: “There is no amnesty for the Arctic.”

Will other world leaders follow Putin’s example?

Rwanda’s Supreme Court just sentenced opposition leader Victoire Ingabire to 15 years in jail. Ingabire is a Hutu and a leading critic of President Paul Kagame, she joins the likes of Deo Mushayidi, Bernard Ntaganda, and Dr. Theoneste Niyitegeka, who are also languishing in prison for political reasons.

Victoire Ingabire was not involved in the Rwandan 1994 genocide, President Paul Kagame was.

War crimes investigator Michael Hourigan, who died a few days ago, found out, that Kagame ordered the assassinations of Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira, thereby igniting the genocide. His report was suppressed by the UN and the USA.

(http://www.whale.to/c/hourigan_report.html)

Kagame started in 1996 the Tutsi revenge genocide, invading Zaire (now DRC) to break up refugee camps and massacre Hutu militants and civilians alike. He supported various insurgencies and militias in Congo, first toppling Mobutu and installing Kabila, then in 1998 starting a war against Kabila, which lasted till 2003. His latest stunt was the M23 rebellion, which Congo could defeat with the help of UN troops.

Paul Kagame should have long ago been sent to Den Hague to stand trial at the International Criminal Court and join Charles Taylor in a neighboring prison cell. Kagame’s war crimes let Taylor’s involvement in Sierra Leone seem minor and forgivable in comparison, his record trumps that of Taylor at least by one magnitude. But he still is the darling of the West because he colludes with the big corporations to exploit the mineral wealth of the eastern Congo. As long as he helps deliver the blood diamonds and blood minerals for (i)gadgets and other consumer toys the worlds self-appointed policemen (USA, UK, France, NATO) will not take action.
Dont worry, Africa
A 2001 UN Report about the illegal exploitation of natural resources in the DRC alleged, that Kagame and Ugandan President Museveni, were “…becoming the godfathers of the illegal exploitation of natural resources in the Democratic Republic of the Congo“. The report claimed that the Rwandan Ministry of Defense contained a “Congo Desk” dedicated to collecting taxes from companies licensed to mine minerals around Kisangani, and that substantial quantities of coltan and diamonds passed through Kigali before being resold on the international market by staff on the Congo Desk. International NGO Global Witness recently conducted field studies and concluded that minerals from North and South Kivu are exported illegally to Rwanda and then marketed as Rwandan.

Paul Kagame will not pardon Victoire Ingabire, nor will he pardon any other political opponent. Will US President Barrack Obama pardon anybody? There would be many inmates worthy of clemency.

US prisons house more than 2.4 million persons, more than one out of every 100 US-American adults is behind bars. The USA has the worldwide highest incarceration rate, with 4.6 percent of the world population, but a quarter of the worlds prisoners. African-Americans make up 40 percent of the prisoners, most of them are convicted on drug charges and other non-violent offenses.
prison hands
Quite a number of US inmates would be considered as political prisoners, if their prison cells were located in a non-Western country. To name just a few:

Attorney Lynne Stewart (who is suffering from breast cancer), convicted of passing messages from her client, Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman.

Chelsea (Bradley) Manning, whose offense was to expose US warcrimes in Iraq/Afghanistan and leak diplomatic cables which documented, how the USA applies pressure on adversaries and allies alike.

Jeremy Hammond and Barrett Brown, arrested for hacking Stratfor.

Brent Betterly, Jared Chase, Brian Church, Sebastian Senakiewicz, Mark Neiweem, arrested before the NATO summit in 2012.

Sister Megan Rice, Michael Walli, and Greg Boertje-Obed, convicted of breaking into a nuclear weapons facility (Y-12 complex in Oak Ridge).

Eric McDavid and Marie Mason, jailed for vandalizing a GMO office and destroying logging equipment.

Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani neuroscientist who was convicted of assaulting her interrogators in Afghanistan.

Dr. Rafil Dhafir, an Iraqi oncologist concerned about the effects of depleted uranium, jailed for breaking the sanctions against Iraq.

Abdelhaleem Ashqar, a Palestinian activist, jailed for his refusal to testify against other Palestinian activists.

Shukri Abu-Baker, Ghassan Elashi, Mohammad El-Mezain, Abdulrahman Odeh, and Mufid Abdulqader, who were collecting money for Palestinian charities and have been convicted of aiding Hamas.

Amina Ali and Hawo Hassan, who had collected clothing for Somalia, imprisoned for aiding al-Shabab.

The Cuban 5, charged for monitoring anti-Cuban terrorists in Miami.

Ricardo Palmera, convicted of holding three captured CIA contractors as prisoner in Colombia.

Oscar Lopez Rivera, a Puerto Rican community activist, imprisoned for “seditious conspiracy.”

Leonard Peltier, a Native American activist, sentenced to life on the basis of fabricated as well as suppressed evidence.

Rev. Joy Powell, an Afro-American activist, convicted of burglary and assault without any evidence or eyewitnesses.

Mumia Abu Jamal, sentenced to death in an unfair trial on the basis of questionable evidence.

Russell Maroon Shoats, Jalil Muntaqim, Mutulu Shakur, Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin, Veronza Bowers, Eddie Conway, Ed Poindexter, David Rice, Herman Bell, Romaine Fitzgerald, Robert Seth Hayes, Kamau Sadiki, Sekou Odinga, and other members of the Black Panther movement.
barb wires
President Obama could also fulfill his promise to close Guantanamo, he could close the prison at Bagram Airbase, the black sites in Eastern Europe and Asia, the secret prisons on US Navy warship. Obama could end the praxis of “enhanced interrogation” (torture), he could end the indefinite detention and transfer all inmates to US facilities to give them a fair trial.

He will not do it, Obama is not Putin.

22.12.2013

With tears in my eyes


I just chop onions and my eyes water up. Are the tears, that are running down my cheeks, tears of joy, because I grew the onions by myself, or tears of sorrow, because the birds picked out and ruined a good part of the transplants and onions sets and the harvest was not as big as expected?

Anyway, the yield was just big enough to last through the winter.

As I disclosed in an earlier post, I harvested a lot of tomatoes, grapes, chard, various berries, and tea leaves. Also a sufficient number of onions, garlic, ramson, chives, peaches, and potatoes. I got a load of apples from a friend for free (my own apple harvest unfortunately was minuscule).

This food is canned, deep frozen, or stored in a dry and cool part of the basement — my supplies will last till summer, maybe even longer. The stored food increases my independence from the food industry and from big retail networks, though I’m still several steps away from complete independence. A local network unfortunately still is in its infancy.

At least I don’t have to buy onions, tomatoes, apples, and tea in a shop and there’s only very seldom the need to visit one of the temples of consumerism, called supermarkets or shopping malls.
shopping cart 2
The shoppers may not see it this way and dwell in the illusion that they are just acquiring a few essential and desperately needed items in a retail outlet, but supermarkets and shopping malls are of course temples, they are places of worship to the cult of consumerism.

Consumerism is mesmerizing and hypnotizing, consumerism casts a spell, which only the strong-willed, the most stubborn and determined can break. It is an evil cult, evidently evil as the shoppers are somnambulating through the aisles with a faraway or glazed look in their eyes, pulling or pushing their trolleys like they would be in trance.

Sometimes shoppers become agitated, exited, even manic, they rush to catch items that supposedly are a rare bargain or are in short supply. Arguments, controversies, brawls, disputes around goods, perceived as precious, ensue between the crazed and spellbound, persons, who in their daily life seem to be reasonable and sane get into a rage and start to act completely irrational.

The shoppers are driven by an insatiable appetite for more. They buy more, they continue buying more and more,  yet their desires, their longings are not fulfilled. “You can never get enough of what you don’t need to make you happy” (Eric Hoffer).

The shoppers think, they possess the items in their shopping cart, yet in reality, the items possess them. Not only in this but also in most other respects of their lives the worshippers who are sleepwalking through the aisles are possessed indeed, they are lost and left at the mercy of marketing strategists and propagandists (impulse buying, branding, fashions, trends), or, to state it more appropriately and accurate, at the mercy of the strategists and propagandists masters.
shopping cart 1
The masters are the ruling plutocrats, persons who acquired immense wealth by heritage or by stealing, robbing, and fraud. The masters use their wealth to control, exploit, and enslave their fellow humans, they use their wealth to amass even more wealth. The masters are not bound by the usual moral codes, they only follow the law of money.

The masters, the ruling plutocrats, are mostly in the shadows (though some of them are narcissistic enough to seek the limelight). They are puppeteers, controlling their puppets (politicians, bureaucrats, managers) from behind the curtain.

The masters, the ruling plutocrats, are the high priests of consumerism.

I don’t ask the blog visitors and subscribers, if they already have slaughtered their proverbial lamb on the altar of consumerism and presented it to the high priests, I also don’t wish the blog visitors a generous, fabulous, and luxurious Christmas, I leave that to the masters.

I wish you ease of mind, peace, and happiness instead.
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A “Security Arc” in the Middle East


Sharmine Narwani   Al-Akhbar
Many observers are correct in noting that the Middle East is undergoing yet another seismic shift — that the Russian-brokered destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal, a US-Iranian rapprochement, the diminished strategic value of Saudi Arabia and Israel, and a US withdrawal from Afghanistan will all contribute to changing regional dynamics considerably.

But what is this new direction? Where will it come from, who will lead it, and what will define it?
It has now become clear that the new Mideast “direction” is guided primarily by the “security threat” posed by the proliferation of extremist, sectarian, Islamist fighters in numbers unseen even in Afghanistan or Iraq. This shared danger has been the impetus behind a flurry of global diplomatic deals that has spawned unexpected cooperation between a diverse mix of nations, many of them adversaries.

These developments come with a unique, post-imperialist twist, though. For the first time in decades, this direction will be led from inside the region, by those Mideast states, groups, sects, and parties most threatened by the extremism.

Because nobody else is coming to “save” the Middle East today.

As Salafist militants swarm various borders — from the Levant to the Persian Gulf to North Africa and beyond — states are disintegrating, their territorial integrity and sovereignty under threat, their institutions and economies in shambles, and their armed forces impotent against the irregular warfare practiced by these invaders.

But from within this chaos, a group of countries on the frontline of the battle has decided to give shape to a solution.

Their answer is to fight the militancy directly, to weed it out of their areas and cut off its roots. Already, they are sharing intelligence, cooperating in the battlefield with their collective resources and working to secure support from the international community.

And so while states are weakening elsewhere in the region, a security alliance is emerging out of a stretch of countries from the Levant to the Persian Gulf: Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran.
security arc
According to a number of informed sources in the Levant, interviewed over the course of several months, this “Security Arc” will seek to achieve several objectives: First, to maintain the territorial integrity and sovereignty of participating countries. Second, to establish rigorous military and security cooperation against immediate and future threats from extremists. Third, to forge a common political worldview that enhances the alliance and can lead to further collaboration in other arenas.

Jordan’s Sunni King Abdullah once dubbed these four nations the “Shia Crescent,” taking an unusually sectarian jab at the rise in influence of Shia governments and political parties in all four nations. But the security alliances now forming between the four states has little to do with the notion of a common “sect.” Instead, Abdullah and his allies have a direct hand in the development of this grouping:

It was, after all, the region’s western-backed Arab monarchies that launched the “counter-revolution” to thwart popular Arab uprisings and re-direct them at their regional adversaries, via Syria. Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, the UAE and their Western allies threw money, weapons, training and resources at unseating Syrian President Bashar al-Assad — in a bid to weaken Iran, isolate Hezbollah and take care of that “Shia threat” once and for all.

But in their single-minded haste to cripple foes, Arab monarchies (supported by Western allies) backed any co-religionist prepared to enter the fight and ignored the sectarian, extremist ideologies that these fighters embraced. They optimistically but illogically calculated that the militancy could be controlled once the mission was accomplished.

To quote Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow Ed Husain in August 2012: “The unspoken political calculation among (US) policymakers is to get rid of Assad first—weakening Iran’s position in the region—and then deal with al-Qaeda later.

In the end, Assad didn’t fall, Iran didn’t waver, Hezbollah dug in, and the Russians and Chinese stepped into the fray. As the Syrian conflict developed into a regional geopolitical battle, heavy weapons, porous borders and increasingly sectarian rhetoric created a unique opportunity — from Lebanon to Iraq — for Salafist militants, including Al Qaeda, to gain influence and create a highly desirable corridor from the Levant to the Persian Gulf.

Former CIA Director Michael Hayden says: “The dominant story going on in Syria is a Sunni fundamentalist takeover of a significant part of the Middle East geography, the explosion of the Syrian state and of the Levant as we know it.”

Today, this ideological brand of political violence marked by summary executions, suicide bombings, beheadings and sectarianism threatens to unravel the entire area and turn it into a stomping ground for “emirs” and their fiefdoms governed by Shariah law. For some, this is a price worth paying — for instance the Saudis continue unabashedly to fund and weaponize these conflicts. Other supporters, particularly in the West, have become fearful that the jihadi march will not stop at their border.

But few have taken any concrete steps to inhibit — financially or militarily — the proliferation of this extremism.

And so it is left for the targeted countries to tackle the problem. The same Western-Arab axis that sought to cripple “Shia” ascendency in the Middle East by fueling sectarianism and encouraging an armed “Sunni” reaction, has now created an urgent common cause among Iranians, Syrians, Lebanese, and Iraqis, based almost entirely on the security threat.

A self-fulfilling prophecy, if you will.

Not a Uniform Union

In Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq, there exist significant — mainly Sunni — populations that currently do not back a security union between the four states. Decades of sectarian propaganda from the GCC and the West has made this demographic highly suspicious of the intentions of Shia Iran and its allies.

Although these populations are just as likely to be targeted by Salafist militants who have now killed Sunni moderates (along with Christians, Kurds and Shia) in Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon, their reluctance to see political foes gain influence has often inclined them to provided cover for militant co-religionists and allowed them to proliferate locally. The choice is painful for this demographic: Let your adversaries rise or let extremists run amok.

But earlier this year, when Hezbollah took the decision to fight openly in Qusayr alongside the Syrian army, it became clear that the parties supporting this security alliance would no longer humor the dissenters.
This Security Arc would be forged with or without the approval of naysayers. And buy-in for the security imperative is coming from an unlikely source: the United States.

In the past few months, Washington has suddenly gone from backing a mostly Sunni ‘rebellion’ in Syria to reaching out to Iran. This about-turn stems from the realization that the US has dangerously overplayed its geopolitical game and allowed religious militancy to swell past the point of no return. Neither Washington nor its NATO partners can reverse this trend unaided. Both failed miserably in the decade-long, superficial “war on terror,” which, if anything, helped sow further seeds of extremism. The US now understands that it needs the assistance of vested regional partners and rising powers that face a more imminent threat from militants — Iran, Russia, China, India, Syria, Iraq, — not just to fight extremism, but to cut off its source in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Yemen, Libya, Afghanistan, and other places.
Saudi Al Qaeda investment
The Americans are in an extremely difficult position: to tackle the spread of extremists, they will have to support military and security solutions from old foes in the region — Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah. For starters, this means that 30-plus years of “policy” will literally be flushed down the toilet and Washington risks alienating longtime regional allies. Moreover, a successful outcome, i.e. eliminating extremism, will almost certainly mean the ascendency of Iran and the downfall of US-ally Saudi Arabia — among the many other reverberations throughout the Mideast that this will entail.

Washington’s conflicting signals on the Middle East are a result of this tortured decision. Actions, however, speak louder than words: the US just struck a nuclear deal with Iran in Geneva in record time, having secretly opened direct channels of communications first. Last month, US President Barack Obama asked to meet his Iraqi counterpart Nuri al-Maliki — soon after, the US began sharing intelligence for the first time since American troops withdrew from Iraq. That first piece of intel, according to Az-Zaman, was on the movement of militants in the Anbar desert. Today, the US-Saudi relationship has soured to the point that even officials question any real convergence of interests; European ambassadors are starting to trek back to Damascus, their intelligence officials lining up to meet with their Syrian counterparts to share information on jihadists; the formidable Israelis have been shunted aside on some major Mideast decisions; NATO-member Turkey is working overtime to ease relations with Iran and Iraq. The list goes on.

These extraordinary developments would not have been feasible a mere six months ago when the blinkers were still on. The speed at which we have been ushered into a new “era of compromise” between adversaries is a testament to the extreme urgency of the jihadist/Salafist problem — and the lengths to which countries will go to address it.

Even if this means bulldozing through entrenched policy and turning it on its head.

As a senior Hezbollah source tells me: “The US is focused more on making arrangements directly with their opponents instead of relying on their allies.” There’s good reason for that. Many of Washington’s regional allies are a source of the instability and will have to be muzzled, coerced and cajoled into accepting the new realities.
Some of these allies are political parties within the Security Arc. They’re being brought into line more quickly now, partly because the threat of terrorism hovers in their own backyards. In Lebanon, for instance, a national army thus far restrained by pro-Saudi political interests looks set to finally tackle Salafist militants in key towns, cities and refugee camps where their numbers have swelled. That’s a tremendous breakthrough after almost three years of sitting on the fence, waiting for “spillover” from Syria and taking virtually no security precautions to prevent it.

Security Arc: Plan of Action

Things are moving rapidly on every front. The convergence of extremist sectarian militias into the 50,000-strong “Islamic Front” has created further common cause on the other side. The US and UK last week withdrew support for rebels, belatedly fearing radicalization of the “rebellion.” And Iran launched diplomatic efforts in neighboring Gulf states to divide their ranks against toeing the old adversarial line, succeeding when Oman refused to support a Saudi initiative for a GCC union.
Syria hourglass
But to stamp out jihadism in Syria and beyond, three main objectives need to be achieved — and it will take a collective effort to get there:

First, is to weed out extremists from inside the areas where they are growing in number and influence and where political will exists: inside the Security Arc, from within Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran. This is primarily a military solution — though some fighters may surrender/exit through negotiated political outreach, or when a mentoring state/individual calls it quits.

Second, is the establishment of a global sanctions regime to financially cripple jihadist/Salafist networks by targeting their sources of funding. This is already being done in small measure, but the West’s relationship with many of the violating states and individuals has prevented any genuine progress in the past. As Patrick Cockburn’s recent column in The Independent “Mass Murder in The Middle East is Funded By Our Friends The Saudis” points out: “Everyone knows where Al Qaeda gets its money, but while the violence is sectarian, the West does nothing.” The new US-Iranian rapprochement — fast-tracked to tackle terror — could change this, given the dramatic realignment of priorities and alliances created in its wake.

Third, is for neighboring states — and even those well beyond the region — to shut down their borders and enforce air-tight immigration security. On Syria’s borders we are already seeing both Turkey and Jordan taking some measures, but the Iraqi border still remains porous and dangerous. Hence, Washington’s recent intel sharing with Iraq.

Gravitating Toward The “Security” Priority

You can see the calculations changing in nations beyond the Security Arc already. Many keenly understand the vital role these four countries will have to play to stem militancy. All eyes right now are on Syria where the security situation is most precarious for the region — particularly in Egypt, Jordan and Turkey.
The latter three are the regional states most likely to support the Security Arc’s objectives, albeit with reservations that accompany some fairly stark political differences.

Jordan, for example, has played “host” to an array of foreign special forces, troops, intelligence agencies and contractors, all focused on the task of bringing down the current Syrian government. But even its longtime financial dependency on Saudi Arabia is not worth the thousands of jihadis stationed on Jordanian territory, waiting to enter conflict zones. Arab media puts the number of Jordanian-origin jihadists inside the country at a horrifying 1,000. By contrast, the Europeans are terrified of even a handful of their own Islamist militants coming home.

According to a well-connected Lebanese source, around four months ago, Jordan, Syria, and Iraq began quiet discussions (on separate bilateral tracks) about economic and security cooperation. The Jordanians initially balked at the security upgrade, but came around eventually. They’re not just worried about extremism, but about economic collapse too — either can set the other off. Worst of all would be complete irrelevance in a region undergoing rapid change. The Jordanians are not mavericks, and sandwiched as they are between Syria and Iraq, it is not hard to see their new direction.

Already, state security courts in Amman are imprisoning prominent Salafists and Jordanian fighters intent on crossing over into Syria. Jordan has shut down its border, enforced tight security around the Zaatari camp for Syrian refugees, and is likely to take further measures as relations with the Syrian government continue to improve.
Turkey terror corridor
The Turks have also taken measures to tighten up their borders — in practice. An internal battle still rages within its Islamist establishment where a hot-headed Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan cast his lot almost three years ago with the Syrian opposition. His intransigence on this issue has cost Turkey: Armed militants have found refuge inside Turkey’s border with Syria, political violence has seeped into the country, Turkey’s popularity has plummeted in the Arab world across all sects, Erdogan’s own suppression of protest has marked him a hypocrite, and Kurdish “autonomy” in Syria raises ambitions for Kurds in neighboring Turkey.

The Turks will understand the security imperative, but the clincher will be the economic ones. Syria needs a lot of reconstruction and Iraq has oil wealth to spend once calm returns. Furthermore, a gas pipeline initiative stretching from Iran to the Mediterranean will altogether bypass Turkey — if it doesn’t play ball.

Egypt is likely to fall in line with the Security Arc for the simple reason that it now faces the same problems. Indebted as the interim military government may be to the petrodollars of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf state sponsors, Egypt will be entirely bankrupt if religious militancy takes hold, as it now threatens to do. Attacks against security forces in the Sinai surged during Egypt’s popular uprising in early 2011, and have gained momentum again since last summer when the military establishment returned to power. Today, non-Bedouin militants from outside the area are flocking to the Sinai, stocked with advanced weaponry from conflicts in Libya and Sudan. During the short reign of the Muslim Brotherhood which endorsed Syrian rebels, thousands of Egyptians flocked to the fight in Syria. It is likely that a state governed or dominated by a secular military establishment will follow the Syrian example and implement heavy security solutions to break the back of extremists.

Whatever one’s political inclinations, there is little doubt that inaction against Salafist militants at this juncture will lead to the disintegration of states throughout the Mideast.

The most dangerous hubs today are Syria, followed by Iraq, because of their political and geographical centrality in the region, and the likelihood of smaller or weaker neighbors being swept into the chaos.

The fight against extremism will therefore start inside the Security Arc, and will receive immediate support from the BRICS states and non-aligned nations. The West may choose to play key roles behind the scenes instead of unsettling their regional allies — at least for a while. But as confrontation escalates, countries will have to “take clear sides” in this pivotal battle, both in the Mideast and outside. Expect opportunism to play a hand — there may be a point at which a “stalemate” may be desirable for some. Few will dare to support the extremists, however, so also anticipate some serious narrative shifts on “good-guys” and “bad-guys” in the Mideast.

This, now, is the real War on Terror. But this time it will be led from inside the Middle East, gain universal support and change the regional political balance of power for generations to come.

18.12.2013

The Saint and the Devil


On a cold and dreary day I sit in front of the computer and ponder, why the words adulation and flatulation have such vastly different meanings and if there could be a content, where these two words, which rhyme perfectly, could be used meaningful side by side.

Yet, as this particular question seems to be too complicated to solve at the moment, I turn to another issue, much easier to understand and more clearcut (at least according to Western journalists). The chosen issue is a comparison of Nelson Mandela (the saint) with Robert Mugabe (the devil).

About the saint:

Nelson Mandela was one of the bright shining stars of goodwill and kindness, he was the personification of peace, mercy, and racial harmony. His passing at the age of 95 has been commemorated by media enterprises all over the world with hundreds of documentaries and thousands of eulogies, comments, reflections, and tributes.

He was a true saint of the 20th century. Don’t get me wrong, I may have a cynical disposition, but in this case I mean it, when I write that he was a true saint!

A man who is caged in gruesome, debilitating, humiliating conditions (Robben Island, Victor Verster prison) for 27 years and nevertheless has not lost his charisma and his ability to smile, a man who despite all his trials is still able to radiate joy, grace, encouragement, and generosity, such a man rightfully deserves to be called a saint.
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A true saint he was, but not without imperfections and weaknesses. After all, Nelson Mandela was not a religious myth, not an esoteric figure, not a metaphysical construction, he was human. Most of the published adulations omit the flaws, most are superficial, trivial, ignorant, and completely miss the point. They are of a quality, which ultimately and definitively answers my question of the first paragraph — at least I don’t have to ponder about that anymore.

(The shallowness of coverage is not surprising. After all, the duty of mass media enterprises is to make profit, to please the owners, to keep the populace sedated, it is not their mission to educate and inform.) 
Only a few articles dig a little bit deeper, I mentioned some of them already in the December link list under the rubric “Beatification and canonization news”. As Mandela is now laid to rest in Qunu and the mass media infatuation (another rhyming possibility) slowly subsides, a few more sane minds (most notably Danny Schechter and Greg Palast) come out of the underbrush where they took cover, to issue more measured and balanced opinions and apprehensions.
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To put matters into the right perspective one needs to keep in mind, that the USA and all other Western nations viewed the ANC and Mandela as terrorists. In August 1962 CIA officer Donald C. Rickard gave the South African police detailed information about Mandela, who had been on the run for 17 months. It was only this information which made Mandela’s arrest and subsequent imprisonment possible.

The ANC was perceived as a terrorist organization and Nelson Mandela was kept on the US government terrorist list until 2008. President Ronald Reagan vetoed sanctions against the Apartheid regime. The International Freedom Foundation, an Afrikaner lobby group, was supported by Senator Jesse Helms, Senator Jeff Flake, and many other prominent Republicans (Grover Norquist, Jack Abramoff, William F. Buckley).
The Apartheid regime in South Africa was sponsored and avidly defended by the West until it was about to crumble because of massive corruption, hardcore military spending, and exploding social unrest in the townships.

The 36,000 Cubans who defeated South African troops in neighboring Angola (Cuito Cuanavale) were ready to move into South Africa. The Vietnamese who had defeated the mighty USA were advising the ANC’s military wing, and an international embargo, leaky though it was, laid siege to South Africa’s economy.

A change was inevitable, but the Western strategists successfully used a scheme (the same as in the Philippines after Ferdinand Marcos) which enabled a political transition under the condition that no social transition occurred. The scheme included carrots and sticks; carrots were international investment and loans, sticks were white flight (withdrawing of capital) and economic isolation.
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The scheme included also attempts, to win over, co-opt, or bribe black leaders. Two years before Mandela’s release the ANC in exile had, in effect, done a deal with prominent members of the Afrikaner elite at meetings in a stately home, Mells Park House, near Bath. Mandela was in fact not only pressured by Western politicians and experts, he was also pushed by a neoliberal faction within his own party.

When Mandela attended the World Economic Forum Davos in 1992, it was with the intention of explaining to those present why nationalization was the right approach for South Africa. But in a series of conversations with other world leaders he was persuaded to support an economic framework based on globalization and neoliberalism from the cookbook of Milton Friedman.

The plans of nationalizing gold mines and banks — owned by Western capital (UK based Anglo American/DeBeers), and distribute the benefits to the indigenous population, were abandoned. Mandela appointed Derek Keys, de Klerk’s finance minister as his own, and kept Chris Stals, a conservative former member of the Broederbond, on the Reserve Bank. Derek Keys successor was Chris Liebenberg, a white banker.

The ANC government consequentially continued existing economic policies of fiscal restraint (to avoid inflation), of an independent Reserve Bank, trade liberalization, and co-optive labour policies. Redistribution was not a priority, it was also not further down the list, it was simply not on the menu anymore.

The original “Reconstruction and Development Program” was cancelled and replaced by GEAR (Growth, Employment and Redistribution), which despite the misleading title was just a finance strategy approach, cheered by banks and corporations. The IMF gave a loan of 850 million US$ under the usual conditions: Fiscal austerity, market liberalization, privatization.

The eminence of free enterprise and property rights were enshrined in every major economic policy statement and the constitution itself, neoliberal compradorism became the dominant phenomenon within the ANC elite, safeguarding international financial interests and protecting white ownership of land, mines, and vital industries.

It is worth noting that the statue of Nelson Mandela at the South African Embassy was paid for by the same corporations that initially supported Mandela’s imprisonment, including Anglo American, South African Mining Group, South Africa’s Synthetic Fuels, chemicals giant Sasol, the South African Gold Coin Exchange, and Standard Bank.

The black and white elites not only conspired to keep economic Apartheid in place, they exported it also to Mozambique, where, with support of the ANC, a policy of land expropriations paved the way for the establishment of white Afrikaner farms using local farm workers. Since then white agribusiness continuously extended its reach into other African countries (Angola, Tanzania, DRC) with large scale investments in commercial farming, food processing and eco-tourism.
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Nelson Mandela thought that he had no chance, he took what was on the table, believing, that in the end his people would benefit and social change would come automatically (trickle down effect) out of economic progress and property.

What a terrible miscalculation! 

The miserable life of the poor majority broadly remains the same as under apartheid. With 25 percent unemployment (52 percent youth unemployment) and a Gini coefficient of 63.1, poverty remains high. Inequality remains high as well — the average white family has six times the income of a black family. Life experience is 53.4 years and the country is on place 121 (out of 190) in the UNDP’s Human Development Index. There are also the problems of a high crime rate and a devastating HIV/AIDS epidemic.

In the face of such statistical data one could come easily to the conclusion that the main change in comparison with the old Apartheid regime is that the old white ruling class is joined by the new black elite.

The curse of natural resources

Gold and diamond production is declining because of intensive exploitation, but South Africa remains a cornucopia of mineral riches. It is still the world’s largest producer of chrome, manganese, platinum, vanadium, and vermiculite, and the second largest producer of ilmenite, palladium, rutile, and zirconium. It is also the world’s third largest coal exporter and a huge producer of iron ore. Nearly 460,000 South Africans work in the mines.

These are low payed, unhealthy, and risky jobs. The living conditions of the men who work in the mines are miserable almost beyond imagination. They have to go down as deep as four kilometers beyond the surface, they have to endure temperatures up to 60 degrees Celsius (140 degrees Fahrenheit) and humidity close to 100 percent. Many miners suffer from bronchitis, asthma, bleeding from bodily orifices, impotence, many die young from cancer and lung diseases (silicosis, pneumoconiosis).

An estimated 60,000 mine workers have been killed through mine accidents and more than one million were permanently disabled since 1900.

430 miners died 1960 in Coalbrook
64 died 1983 in Hlobane
29 died 1985 at Middelbult mine
177 died 1986 at Kinross mine
53 died 1993 at Middelbult mine
104 died 1995 at Vaal Reefs mine
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In 2012 34 miners were shot dead by police during a strike in Marikana against British platinum producer Lonmin. In September 2013 80,000 gold miners went on strike.

The global view

South Africa is only one example of the global rush to exploit the remaining riches under the surface (mineral and fossil fuel deposits). The Western consumers insatiable appetite for new goods and the energy intensive lifestyle of Western societies make it necessary to achieve control of all exploitable regions. The plight of local population is of nobodies concern.

The local elites are indoctrinated in Western elite schools like Harvard and Yale, the political leaders are bribed — every man has his price. The incorruptible leaders are taken care of in one way or the other (Allende, Aristide, Gaddafi, Chavez).
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Haiti fell, Libya fell, Syria still holds firm but is devastated. Somalia and the DRC are failed states, everywhere else Western cronies rule and sell out their countries to the worlds big corporations.

French troops are on the march in Mali and the Central African Republic, in 2011 France intervened in Ivory Coast.

Only a few countries have escaped the global onslaught and kept their independence. In Latin America there are Cuba, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, to some extent Argentina. In Africa there is Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe is the lone holdout.

About the devil

After Mandela was released from prison he had countless meetings with political leaders around the world, who explained to him that if white flight occurred, his country would mimic Zimbabwe’s fate. Which was: Being isolated, outlawed, broke, on the verge of collapse.

It was explained to him, that the international community (of Western countries) would not take kindly attempts of nationalization and redistribution, he was warned that instability, chaos, lawlessness, even a bloodbath could ensue from attempts to change the existing social fabric.

Mugabe’s leadership was the bad example and Mandela had to avoid Mugabe’s mistakes.
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Nelson Mandela enjoyed a long friendship with Robert Mugabe. Both attended Fort Hare University in South Africa. Both served long prison sentences and were seen as their countries’ liberators.

Mugabe led his country to freedom like Mandela did, but when he distributed the big landholdings of white farmers to poor blacks, he was condemned, vilified, demonized. The West imposed stringent economic sanctions (Section 4 C of ZDERA, which blocked financial assistance from international lending institutions), which are still in place, and tried to destabilize the government with the usual methods (NGO’s on a humanitarian mission, economic sabotage, corruptible politicians like Morgan Tsvangirai).

Land Reform

In 1980 white farmers, who made up less than one percent of the population, owned 70 percent of the most valuable farming land.

This has changed significantly, and nearly 14 million hectares land have been redistributed from white colonial settlers and their descendants to the black majority. Since 2000, the Mugabe-led government embarked on a fast-track land reform program to forcefully correct the inequitable land distribution created by colonial rule. Mugabe initially opposed farm takeovers, but war veterans who until then had failed to benefit from their liberation war service spontaneously occupied some 6,000 white-owned farms in defiance of the government.
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Recent studies reveal, that the land distribution was mostly successful with solid agricultural production happening on the new smallholder farms (plots of between five and 10 hectares) and that substantial surpluses are being produced. 170,000 new farm owners have provided employment for more than one million people (the new farms are less capital intensive but more labour intensive). There is also significant investment in the new land, including the clearing of plots, the purchase of farm assets, the digging of wells. New homes, schools, roads, and dams have been built. Nearly all of this has been done by the new settlers themselves with only little outside assistance.

Small grain and edible bean production has increased, but cash crops like cotton and tobacco (for Chinese smokers) have also boomed, which is not a desirable development, because it increases deforestation and economic dependency.

While South Africa’s economy remains white- and Western-dominated, Zimbabwe is taking steps to indigenize its economy, placing majority control of the country’s natural wealth and productive assets in the hands of blacks. In 2008 Robert Mugabe signed the “Indigenization and Economic Empowerment Bill”, which enables Zimbabweans to take over and control many foreign owned companies. In the long run 50 percent of all the businesses in the country shall be transferred into local black African hands.

Especially bothersome for the West are Mugabe’s plans to ban raw mineral exports as well as indigenize mining companies like Canadian-owned New Dawn Mining and Zimplats, a subsidiary of platinum-mining multinational Implats.
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Despite Western propaganda claims, that Mugabe has driven Zimbabwe’s economy into collapse, the economy is actually booming and doing better than most other African nation. This is mainly due to China’s growing economic influence and to soaring mineral prices.

World Bank economists called it an “amazing” recovery and US-think tank CATO institute was left head-scratching and clueless, stating in an analysis:

Since 2000, Zimbabwe has consistently earned the rank of one of the world’s least economically free countries….Among the reasons for Zimbabwe’s bottom rank are its poor property rights protection, high tariffs on imports, an increasingly bloated state sector, great difficulty in starting a business, and onerous regulations regarding hiring and firing….Zimbabwe is thus a curious outlier that requires further investigation….Zimbabwe’s rapid GDP growth and poor business environment appear to be a paradox.”

It seems, that some disciples of neoliberalism actually believe in what Milton Friedman and the Chicago gang of economics were preaching.

The national elections in Zimbabwe in July upset the West when President Robert Mugabe and his ruling ZANU-PF party swept the executive and legislative polls. Despite the monitoring and subsequent endorsement of the elections by the African Union and SADC, (the regional Southern African Development Community), USA and Britain maintain their draconian sanctions against the country.

A few more (and maybe unexpected) details about the devil

In 2008 Zimbabwe had a literacy rate of 90 percent, the highest in Africa. Mugabe always prioritized education, which is not surprising, because while Mandela was a lawyer, Mugabe was a teacher, who’s interest in learning and teaching became manifest already in his early youth, when he spent most of his time reading in the school’s libraries. Mugabe’s brother Donato once said, that “Robert’s only friends are his books.”

Robert Mugabe has probably the highest academic credentials of all world leaders. In addition to a Bachelor of Arts degree from Fort Hare he earned five other university degrees by correspondence courses during his eleven year imprisonment, and a seventh one while he was already president.

His prison conditions where not as harsh as Robben Island but when his three-year-old son Nhamodzenyika died from malaria in Ghana in 1966 and Mugabe petitioned the prison governor to leave on parole to attend the funeral he was refused permission by then Prime Minister Ian Smith.
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Robert Mugabe was not always depicted as an evil dictator, he was even on the short list for the 1981 Nobel Peace Prize. When he won Zimbabwe’s first election, he renounced retribution against whites. “Our people, young and old, men and women, black and white, living and dead, are, on this occasion, being brought together in a new form of national unity that makes them all Zimbabweans.”

Mugabe’s general viewpoint was, that a just and eqalitarian society could not be built on the foundations of the past and that a new social order, based on subsistence and peasant values, had to be constructed, yet he made important (and contentious) concessions in the negotiations with the white rulers. He accepted a “willing buyer, willing seller” plan for land reform, he allowed 20 seats in the new parliament to be reserved for whites, and he agreed to a ten-year moratorium on constitutional amendments.

In November Thabo Mbeki, Mandela’s successor, revealed in an interview, that “There is a retired chief of the British armed forces who said he had to withstand pressure from the then prime minister of the United Kingdom Tony Blair …. Tony Blair who was saying to the chief of the British armed forces, ‘You must work out a military plan so that we can physically remove Robert Mugabe.’”
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A few last words to close this comparison of Mandela and Mugabe: Nelson Mandela was a good friend and admirer of Muammar Gaddafi and he was a friend of Fidel Castro Ruz, During a visit to the USA in 1990 he severely upset his host by praising Fidel Castro, PLO chairman Yasser Arafat, and Muammar Gaddafi as his “comrades in arms”, saying: “There is no reason whatsoever why we should have any hesitation about hailing their commitment to human rights.”
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Nelson Mandela was indeed on the right side of history and despite the shortcomings of South Africa’s transition he deserves the unanimous praise from every corner of the mass media world.
One only wonders, what Western media will write, when Robert Mugabe dies.


P.S.: This text could only scratch the surface and many interesting details had to be omitted (for instance Mugabe’s humble origin, his religiosity, and his gay bashing or that facts, that Mandela divorced his first wife after falling in love with Winnie Mandela and that he was troubled by severe marital problems after his release from prison).

Behind every great man there’s a great woman, and as the women in both persons life shaped their husbands personality probably more than anything else, these women’s own life stories truly deserve to be told. It could not be done in this text but a sequel with their stories will follow as soon as possible. For the time being, consider this:

The memorial service for Nelson Mandela at the FNB Stadium in Soweto was attended by leaders from over 90 countries, When the speaker (ANC deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa) announced, that Mugabe had entered the stadium, Zimbabwe’s President was greeted by thunderous applause, making the reception of most other dignitaries seem to be lukewarm in comparison. There was only one person who enjoyed similar acclaim and cheers from the audience: It was Winnie Mandela.
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